Work Text:
“It’s raining,” Inej said tersely. She was sitting on the sill of Kaz’s open window, a brisk wind and the icy droplets it carried whipping at her face.
“Didn’t ask,” Kaz rasped. “Now get moving. It’s nearly 12 bells and I want you back before sunrise.”
Inej scowled at him but said nothing. She pulled the hood of her traveling cloak snugly over her head and set out into the wet and frigid night.
***
Two days later, Kaz was in his office, the books for the Crow Club spread out across his desk. His spider was supposed to be there at 2 bells, so where was she? Inej was never late, and a strange, uneasy feeling was beginning to prickle inside of him. He shook his head, trying to clear it. He was Dirtyhands. He didn’t worry about people, especially not a Suli girl indentured to Per Haskell. And yet, there it was, that pesky voice in his head demanding to know what was keeping her.
Kaz’s head whipped around when he heard a disturbance outside. To his surprise, it was the Wraith, normally silent and graceful as an acrobat, now clambering noisily through his office window. She dropped to the floor, a little out of breath, before throwing her hood back to face him.
Suddenly, all intentions of scolding her for her tardiness vanished. Inej looked as Kaz had never seen her. The usual bronze glow of her skin was gone, replaced by a dull pallor. Her eyes were rimmed red and watery, as if she hadn’t slept properly in days. Her nose had been rubbed raw and, judging by the way she was breathing through her mouth, Kaz assumed must be blocked entirely.
“I heard you come in,” he said, once he realized he’d been staring.
“My mistake. I didn’t realize I was meant to sneak up on you, too,” Inej said irritably. Kaz thought vaguely that the rasp in her voice could rival his own. “What business, Kaz?”
“I… I have a job,” he answered.
“I assumed. And?” Why was he hesitating? Kaz had never once cared about one of the Dregs being sick on a job, so long as it wasn’t the plague. And even if he had cared, it would’ve been considered a gross display of weakness for any of them to admit they were too ill to do it. So why now, why her?
Inej coughed into her fist. It sounded painful and wet, the force of it rattling her chest. When it passed, she shook her shoulders out, sniffling, before straightening her spine again. Kaz’s mind was made up.
“I’m taking you off it,” he said.
“What? Why would you-?” Her objection was cut off by more forceful coughing. When she was finished she looked weary, but pressed on regardless.
“I’m your best spider. Who else would you use instead?”
“This job doesn’t need a spider,” Kaz invented. “I need a bruiser this time, and last I checked, you don’t fit that description.”
Inej crossed her arms, looking skeptical.
“Since when have you required just one or the other? Tell me the details of the assignment.”
“No,” said Kaz shortly. Inej swallowed thickly, and Kaz didn’t miss her wince as it went down. Then, she released a sigh.
“I want to pay off my indenture in this lifetime, Kaz. I’m sure I could be of some use to you.”
“If you get pneumonia, you won’t be much use to me at all, will you?” The words tumbled out of him before he could stop them. Inej appeared as though she might actually laugh.
“Maybe you should’ve thought about that before you sent me out in the rain the other night. You didn’t seem to care what bug I caught then.”
Kaz’s stomach twisted. Did he cause this? And if he did, could he actually be feeling guilty about it? He didn’t like to believe he could feel things like guilt anymore. It was just another weakness, something he’d buried under the guise of Kaz Brekker, most dangerous boy in the Barrel.
Inej sneezed once, twice, three times - strong enough to fold herself in half. Kaz quickly retrieved his handkerchief from his jacket pocket and shoved it into her hand.
“You’re off the job,” he repeated firmly, “and I want you in your room and far away from it. I’m finding someone else to fulfill your role.”
“But I’m the Wraith-“ she sneezed again.
“And if you sneeze like that on the job you’ll get us all killed. I’ve made my decision.”
Inej blew her nose heavily into the handkerchief, and when she raised her eyes to Kaz again, she looked utterly miserable.
“Rest,” he said, more gently this time. He didn’t know why he said it like that. He needed to get out of this room - no - he needed her to get out of this room.
Inej nodded, apparently admitting defeat. She crumpled the handkerchief in her hand and padded silently out of Kaz’s office.
***
Kaz struggled to redesign his plan all afternoon. He couldn’t seem to make it work without Inej, not trusting anyone else to be as stealthy or surefooted as the Wraith. He found himself constantly distracted by the thought of her - pale-faced and sniffling in her bedroom downstairs - a predicament that was only compounded by the continual sounds of her coughs and sneezes that ricocheted through the floor boards into his office.
You didn’t seem to care what bug I caught then. The words rang in Kaz’s ears like gunfire.
By 5 bells, he couldn’t take it anymore. He grabbed his hat and his crow’s head cane and set off down the steps and out of the Slat.
He made it halfway down the street before he had to stop and ask himself where exactly he was going. Kaz didn’t operate in the business of kindness. He had no idea how to care for a sick person, and questioned why he thought he should try in the first place. A cold wasn’t something he could hold at knife point, another enemy he could threaten into submission. Inej needed someone more adept at this than he was, yet the idea of going to someone like Jesper for help made bile rise in Kaz’s throat. He couldn’t explain why, but he felt that the Wraith’s illness was his business alone. He would let no one else near her in such a vulnerable state.
On the corner, there was a café. That was a start. He went inside and ordered a hot peppermint tea from the bearded man behind the counter, who a moment later presented Kaz with a large paper cup. Steam was rising from its surface in slow, fragrant spirals. Kaz gave a short nod of thanks and disappeared from the store, leaving his payment on the counter.
Back at the Slat, Kaz put on his most unapproachable glare. He wanted no one to talk to him, to ask him where he’d been or if he’d seen the Wraith. He mounted the stairs at a heightened pace, pointedly ignoring his own feelings of uncertainty about what he was about to do.
Kaz rapped sharply on Inej’s bedroom door.
“Enter,” called a gravelly voice from behind it. He pushed the door open and stumped into the room.
Inej was sitting up in bed, her hair undone and a book of Suli proverbs in her lap. She looked about as poorly as she had before, the color high in her cheeks and a thin blanket draped around her shoulders. The belts of knives she normally wore strapped to her body were slung over the back of a chair. Kaz recognized his own handkerchief scrunched up on the nightstand.
“What business?” Inej croaked, ever the professional. Kaz worked his jaw. What business, indeed.
“No business,” he said, when he found his voice. “Only this.” He crossed the room and pressed the paper cup into her hands.
Inej looked down into it, a mixture of surprise and puzzlement painting her features. She looked up at Kaz, who was standing there in silence, and took a tentative sip. She sighed as the tea soothed her throat.
“Thank you,” she said softly. Kaz gave a singular nod. Then Inej started coughing again. It was the same wet, rattling sound Kaz had heard in his office. He snatched the cup from her hands to keep her from spilling it.
“Do you need a medik?” Kaz asked stiffly.
“A medik?”
“Or a healer. I know one that owes me a favor. I could have him here in a matter of hours-“
“It’s just a cold, Kaz,” Inej replied, bemused.
“Well you sound awful,” Kaz enunciated. “I can hear you all the way upstairs.” Inej bristled at once.
“I apologize if I’m disrupting your work with my illness,” she sniffed.
“No, that’s not what I-“ he dragged a gloved hand down his face. Why was he so bad at this? "I only meant that I want you heal quickly. This job is proving difficult to perform without you, and I…”
What? Need you? Want you there? All of these sentiments felt too personal for Kaz. Perhaps too honest as well.
“I’ll be fine,” Inej said, more kindly this time. “I just need time to rest.”
“I see,” Kaz said at once. He placed her tea on the bedside table with a dull click. “I’ll leave you alone then.” He turned to go, but Inej called from her bed.
“Wait, uh, Kaz… I didn’t mean I wanted to kick you out. I actually don’t mind the company. It’s been boring in here all alone.”
Kaz paused, halfway to the door. Every part of him knew that he should go, and yet he found he did not want to leave her yet. He flexed his fingers on the head of his cane.
“Alright,” he replied at last.
Carefully, Kaz moved Inej’s knives off the chair and dragged it over to the side of her bed. He lowered himself gingerly to sitting, stretching his bad leg out in front of him.
For a moment, the two of them just stared at one another. Kaz didn’t know what to talk to her about if he wasn’t asking for her latest report or giving her instructions for a job. They had spent a lot of time together in the past few months, and Kaz, admittedly, had come to quite enjoy her company. But it had always been business; nothing more, nothing less. He was beginning to regret his decision to stay, when Inej broke the silence.
“Is the tea from you, then?” She asked.
“I brought it, didn’t I?”
“Well yes, but I thought maybe Jesper-“
“No,” Kaz said crossly. “I got it for you. From a shop. Down the street.” Inej nodded, took another sip.
“That was kind of you,” she said finally. Kaz merely shrugged.
“I owed you,” he said in explanation.
“Owed me? For what?”
“This,” Kaz answered with a noncommittal jerk of his head. “I sent you out in the rain.” Inej arched an eyebrow out him.
“Are you actually feeling guilty, Kaz? I didn’t know you had it in you.” Kaz scowled in reply. His first instinct was to threaten - to tell her that she was not to speak of this to anyone and ruin his reputation. But when he raised his eyes to her, he found that she was smiling, and in that moment, he knew that Inej would never betray him. This secret was hers to keep.
“Well if you owed me, then I guess we’re straight now. Agreed?” Inej asked, the smile still dancing on her lips. She held out her small hand for him to take. Kaz stared at it a long moment.
“Agreed,” he muttered. He placed his gloved hand in hers. They shook.
“Good,” Inej replied. She released him and sank back onto her pillows, clutching the cup of tea to her chest. It wasn’t as hot now, but Kaz could see her breathing deeply, inhaling the smell of peppermint. Slowly, she let her eyes fall shut.
Kaz watched her for a while in silence, the way her chest rose and fell. It felt intimate, like something he wasn’t supposed to see, and yet she had closed her eyes of her own accord. She had trusted him to watch over her as she fell asleep.
When her grip on the cup began to slacken, Kaz carefully reached over and slid it from her hands, resting it down on the bedside table.
It seemed time to go, so he rose quietly from his chair.
“Get some rest, Wraith,” her murmured, and he departed from her room.
***
A few days later, Kaz awoke with a start. He’d fallen asleep at the desk in his office, and the papers he’d been working on were stuck to the side of his face. It was completely dark outside now and the candle he’d lit earlier was burning low in its holder; he wondered how long he’d been out.
He took a deep sniff, his head aching horribly, and pressed a gloved knuckle to his nose to stifle a sneeze. All day he’d been sequestered in his office, away from Per Haskell and the rest of the Dregs. Kaz didn’t want anyone to know that the bastard of the Barrel could succumb to illness, but he had caught Inej’s cold, and it was becoming impossible to hide. It was easier, then, to stay in his rooms, and avoid having to maintain appearances altogether.
As Kaz scrubbed a hand over his face, his tired eyes fell on a collection of items on the corner of his desk - items that had not been there before.
There was a ceramic mug of tea, steam rising from it as if it had just been poured; his own handkerchief, freshly washed and neatly folded; and beside it, a note written in tight black scrawl: I owed you.
This must’ve been what had woken him. Although he did not hear the Wraith, he sensed the disturbance in the atmosphere.
Kaz reached across the desk and took the mug in his hands, allowing its heat to warm him through his gloves. If he was right by the smell, it was a Suli blend; something with Turmeric and plenty of herbs. He took a measured sip, gazing thoughtfully at his window. It was open just enough to let in a cool night breeze.
Some strange feeling stirred in Kaz’s gut, and he felt the corners of his lips quirk upward without his permission. He drained the mug in a few quick swallows and resigned himself to finally get in bed.
Kaz would stay in his room recovering for the next few days, and if mysterious cups of tea and bowls of broth continued to appear on his desk like magic, well… then nobody needed to know.